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Friday, June 25, 2010

I thought the big story a story tonight at Tropicana Field was the Upton Brothers playing against each other for the first time. See? There ended up being a slightly bigger story at The Trop. Edwin Jackson threw the Diamondbacks' second ever no-hitter against his former team. It wasn't pretty but it goes into the record books nonetheless. I usually get pretty excited to cover great moments in poor hitting but I'm not sure that's what happened. Let's take a look at some weird stats from this year's latest no-no.

149 Pitches Obviously, this is the one everyone will be talking about and will serve as a recurring theme in this post. That's a lot of pitches. Excuse me while I pat myself on the back for that nugget of analysis. It's the most pitches thrown in a game since Livan Hernandez in 2005. Now I could sit around here and make Dusty Baker jokes till 3 a.m. but Keith Law already won the night.

8 Walks/6 Strikeouts That is one way to drive up your pitch count, shoot for double digit walks. Of his 149 pitches, Edwin threw 79 for strikes. For context, Strasburg throws 79 strikes in 75 pitches.[citation needed] The 8 walks in a no-hitter is third all-time. Jim Maloney tossed 10 no-hit innings while walking 10 in 1965. B-R doesn't have pitch count data so I'll assume Maloney threw 231 pitches on that beautiful day in August. A.J. Burnett threw a no-hitter in 2001 and walked 9 batters. He threw 129 pitches, 65 for strikes. Perhaps the Edwin-A.J. comp is a good one.

3 Clean Innings Three! Edwin only retired the side in order on three out of nine occasions. I don't want to rain on the kid's parade but there is a good amount of luck going into this no-hitter considering how long he pitched from the stretch.

Edwin Jackson is still only 26-years-old but over his 8-year career he is a 4.71 ERA guy or 5% worse than the league average pitcher. But Edwin's no-hitter and 149 pitches will be the big story until Doug Fister no-hits the Brewers tomorrow without striking anybody out.